Stationary vessel protection devices are known. Examples of known relatively fixed vessel protection devices include padded seawalls, vehicle tires placed between vessels and docks, air-filled bumpers fixed relative to docks and docked vessels, and the like.
A known dock wheel design for being mounted on a front corner of a dock adjacent to where docking vessels enter a slip include a dock wheel, such as the Taylor Made dock wheel available from Taylor Made Products, a division of The Nelson A. Taylor Co., Inc., of Gloversville, N.Y. 12078.
Additional known devices include various sizes of inflatable or solid fenders (e.g. inflated/inflatable wheels) that hang off a boat or vessel. Sometimes such known devices are used adjacent a piece of wood that protects the vessel from the piling.
Another known device includes one or more hollow support masts each having a slotted channel vertically disposed along its length.
A further known device includes a fiberglass type whip, which is like an antenna, which attaches to a dock, and which will hold a small vessel off of a dock by means of a taut line tied between the vessel and the whip.
A further known device include a rubber type cushioning strip that attaches to a dock or piling thus allowing the vessel to rub against it as it moves.
Known marine vessel protection devices have drawbacks such as the inability to automatically maintain a docked vessel offset from a side of a dock or piling, or in a boat slip, even as tides come in and out, storm waters raise the levels of the water in which the vessel is docked, currents shift, and the like.
It may be seen that there is a need for a vessel protection device which overcomes these and other drawbacks of the prior art.